


What was love to ones such as they?

by Starisia



Category: D.Gray-man
Genre: Drabble, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-03
Updated: 2016-09-03
Packaged: 2018-08-12 18:16:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,934
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7944415
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Starisia/pseuds/Starisia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>'Love'.</p><p>
It was such a simple word with such a complex meaning...</p>
            </blockquote>





	What was love to ones such as they?

**Author's Note:**

> Hello my lovelies~  
> This is actually something older, but for some reason I guess I never got around to posting it here. Not completely sure why, but better late than never I suppose. So, after a bit of revamping here we are.

'Love'

What was Love to one such as he?

A deformed child; abandoned, broken, shattered and hastily put back together with no regard to how it worsened his deformity. Leaving countless scars and marks on the once flawless expanse of skin; the signs of a hard life many could scarcely imagine.

It was such a simple word with such a complex meaning – a meaning his battered heart couldn't quite grasp and could never even pray to understand. He had once believed he knew what that thing called 'Love' was; what it could make one do.

He had once thought he possessed such a fragile thing when that agony engulfed his heart and mind, body and soul; thought he knew what it felt like to have someone he Loved and someone who Loved him when he was held, safe and secure, in his foster father's arms. Thought he'd known the power it held when the demon appeared before him, the promises spilling from his lips as deadly sweet as poisoned honey. persuading him to call out his father's name.

He thought he understood how it felt to Love someone in the brief moment of happiness and uplifting joy when that iron skeleton began to move and jerk and when his name fell from between iron teeth in his father's voice, only to have the feeling swept away by fear and guilt as that voice spoke again, crying out with pain and anger and betrayal as though calling his name was the worst thing he could have ever done.

He thought he understood what Love was; that it was what had been ripped away, leaving the gaping hole in his soul that made his silver eyes grow listless and made living alone a chore so taxing he didn't care if he continued to do so. Didn't care if the red headed stranger he would come to call 'Master' just left him there, alone in the dusty attic to die and rot. But, as time passed, any certainty he had had begun to fade.

All he knew, as the years of harsh training hardened his body and heart, his fragile strength growing steadily till it became a flawless mask of false cheer, feigned smiles, and a gentlemanly façade, was that it was what made the akuma cry out for the ones who called out their names. The ones whose lives they were forced to take, whose bodies they were forced to claim with no more than a few simple words from a demon's lips.

He thought it was what made him fight, what made him wish to save the crying souls of the akuma, but something deep within told him that it was different, that it was something else, something stronger, something…  _more_.

What was Love to one such as he?

He knew deep in his heart that he honestly didn't know and he never thought he would.

'Love'

What was Love to one such as he?

A mockery of a human being; trapped in a false body, a product of some scientist's sick, twisted fantasy. No more than an experiment, failed and flawed, staved for termination the instant the memories that they'd tried so desperately to eradicate crept their way back into his mind. At first as the beautiful ghost and then as the haunting memories of the akuma and lotus blossoms, the hand reaching towards an azure sky he had never seen and the beautiful young woman; her kind hazel brown eyes, that warm smile that ignited a warmth deep within his heart for reasons he couldn't even begin to comprehend.

It was annoying, insistent, forceful. Nagging at him from the moment he saw her to keep looking until he found her once more. It was agitating, infuriating, making him long for it to leave him be, even as he continued his fruitless search, even as he kept watching, waiting, for the day he'd finally see her face somewhere outside of his own mind, outside of the only memory he retained from that life. The one that had been taken alongside his oblivion when they returned him from its hold with no more purpose than causing pain through the hours they spent trying to force the synchronization onto him, repeatedly breaking, shattering, ripping him to shreds just so he could heal and they could begin all over again.

It was like a poison in his eyes. It corroded the heart, chipping away at the layers of stone and steel, ice and snow, long ago erected to keep such pitiful, meaningless things from getting into his already battered heart.

It gave others a power over you – a power more lethal than any other. A power to make or destroy, shatter or save with no more than a few words or actions.

It got in and wormed its way into every crack and crevice of a guarded heart, no matter how strong its defenses were, leaving a comfortable warmth where there had once been agonizing cold. It gave security and yet it gave the worst sort of vulnerability along with it.

It flowed through the veins like venom, warming you with that dangerous comfort. He just couldn't understand how so many could long for it when it was such a lethal thing, that continued to gnaw and bite and battle, that was slowly but surely spreading desperation through veins just as the tattoo spread across skin, jagged lines forming like cracks in the ice.

He had long ago locked away his heart, knowing all too well what happened when someone who was given that key, that power, was ripped away. How it could leave one in tatters, broken, shattered beyond repair, with not so much as a single clue about how to pull the pieces back together. How much it hurt, ached, burned with a new form of agony that no external wound could ever pray to compare to – because wounds always healed over time. Lasted for only scant amounts of time, but the tearing, burning, wrenching heartache seemed to stretch on, refusing to fade or heal.

He never wanted that curse, never wanted that poison that, even after so many years, had yet to fade. Had yet to be neutralized, neither by his own healing abilities or the akuma's virus that had been spread through him more times than he cared to remember. And it wasn't long before he began wishing it was that virus that coursed through him instead of this wretched venom that seemed to be his constant burden.

What was Love to one such as he?

It was a poison, a weakness in his eyes… and he never thought he'd see the day that changed.

'Love'

What was Love to ones such as they?

Human weapons chosen by a force neither could control; trapped on a leash and chain tied to the order one despised, saw as a prison he'd been bound to since the day he was 'born' while the other saw it as a home. Full of familiar faces and kind smiles that had since grown false, suspicious and untrusting beneath the friendly façades of the people he'd grown to care for. A care he continued to foster even as they began to see no more than the darkness that resided deep within his slowly withering soul.

What was it to ones such as they? Beings whose lives were measured in mere weeks, if not days, hours, minutes or seconds. Beings so few would weep for, even as they fell in the ever waging war that had already claimed so many lives, all of which were now no more than names engraved in stone – names theirs would inevitably join.

It was sinful, fatal, frowned upon, shameful.

Something that would surly get them burned, persecuted, shunned. It was wrong, vile, unnatural in the eyes of the ones they worked under, but even knowing this, they couldn't deny it.

It was passionate nights spent in secret, bodies joined, limbs tangled beneath the sheets as the heat and pleasure and bliss ensued, threatening to burn them alive with its intensity. It was the warmth shared in the heated glances others misconstrued as hate when it was truly dark, primal, burning desire that raged within.

It was beautiful, wonderful, everything. Made all the sweeter, pleasurable, sinful, right by the knowledge that it was wrong in the eyes of the servants of the God that had damned them to these wretched existences of pain, war, suffering, heartache, and loss.

It was soothing touches exchanged when no one else could see, actions that spoke even louder than the battles waged by barbed tongues where words flew back and forth in scathing tones. It was the security found in each other's arms, the relief that came with each glimpse of the other after battle, after the missions, the times when they would go days, weeks, months without so much as hearing the other's name. Not knowing whether the other had lived or died or if they would ever see them again. It was the desire, lust, want, and  _need_  that would take hold the instant cobalt met silver, and the passionate dance that would inevitably ensue the instant the door was closed and locked and they were left in privacy. Sometimes it was rough, demanding and swift, animalistic, others it was gentle, slow, passionate, and oh, so sweet, as they drank in each others' touch, reveled in the fact that they were both alive, safe, together even if only for a short while.

But no matter what it always left them floating and breathless with hearts lighter than they had ever been outside of their welcome embrace, neither willing to move as they slowly drift into the welcome oblivion always found in the other's arms.

It was the comfort taken from being able to let the masks crumble, to be able to be who they truly were when it was no one but them, the moon and the stars and the night sky. It was defiance and surrender, and a willingness to be whatever the other needed, a willingness to belong, a need to claim, to be claimed. To mark and be marked just so the proof would remain for a time that there was someone there for them – even if it would forever remain their secret. A secret no other would ever be allowed to learn.

It was the reason they would stay strong and do no more than bow their heads before the masses, only to shed tears of remorse and loss and  _pain_  in private if the other fell. It was the reason they fought as hard as they did, not just so they could survive, but so they could return, so they wouldn't be the cause of the other's pain.

'Love'

What was Love to ones such as they?

It was what finally broke down the barriers, what finally gave the cure to the poison that had slowly been ripping one apart; making him desire this venom and becoming like an addiction that formed stronger than any other – making him  _want_  it to spread till every cell was infected. It was what finally gave the answer to the other; making him see what he truly fought for and helping him see what it was that he had been unable to see all along. It was what finally made the smiles real and what made the ice melt. What had finally,  _finally_ , delivered some form of salvation to their two wretched souls.

It was what they'd finally found.

And what they prayed to never lose.

  
  


 

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you very much for reading and I hope you enjoyed.  
> Comments and kudos are greatly appreciated.


End file.
